A method for identifying hydrometeor types (rain, graupel, and wet snow) based on a microwave link is proposed in this paper. The measured hydrometeor size distribution (HSD) data from the winters of 2014 to 2019 in Nanjing, China, were used to carry out simulation experiments to verify the performance of the model. Single-, dual-, and tri-frequency models (combinations of 15 GHz, 18 GHz, 25 GHz, 38 GHz, 50 GHz, 60 GHz, 70 GHz, and 80 GHz) were established with the extreme learning machine (ELM) algorithm. The results showed that the performance of the tri-frequency models was overall better than that of the dual-frequency models, for which the performance was better than that of the single-frequency models. The mean (maximum) test set accuracies of the single-frequency, dual-frequency, and tri-frequency models reached 75.8%, 80.7%, and 83.2% (83.0%, 84.4%, and 85.6%), respectively. For the dual-frequency and tri-frequency models, it was found that the accuracy increased with the overall frequency or the frequency difference. In addition, the influences of different noise levels on the model performance were also analyzed. Finally, the effects of position and length of link relative to precipitation cell were analyzed and are also discussed.

High-precision retrieval of rainfall over large areas is of great importance for the research of atmospheric detection and the social life. With the rapid development of communication satellite constellations and 5G communication networks, the use of widely distributed networks of earth–space links (ESLs) and horizontal microwave links (HMLs) to retrieve rainfall over large areas has great potential for obtaining high-precision rainfall fields and complementing traditional instruments of rainfall measurement. In this paper, we carry out the research of combining multiple ESLs with HMLs to retrieve rainfall fields. Firstly, a rainfall detection network for retrieving rainfall fields is built based on the atmospheric propagation model of ESL and HML. Then, the ordinary Kriging interpolation (OK) and radial basis function (RBF) neural network are applied to the reconstruction of rainfall fields. Finally, the performance of the joint network of ESLs and HMLs to retrieve rainfall fields in the area is validated. The results show that the joint network of ESLs and HMLs based on OK algorithm and RBF neural network is capable of retrieving the distribution of rain rates in different rain cells with high accuracy, and the root mean square error (RMSE) of retrieving the rain rates of real rainfall fields is lower than 0.56 mm/h, and the correlation coefficient (CC) is higher than 0.996. In addition, the CC for retrieving stratiform rainfall and convective rainfall by the joint network of ESLs and HMLs is higher than 0.949, indicating that the characteristics of the two different types of rainfall events can be accurately monitored.